Thanks to a reminder from friend and fellow word pusher Keith R.A. DeCandido, I’m happy to steer faithful readers to some recent reviews of some my oldest Star Trek work. Dan Gunther is a regular reader and reviewer of Star Trek fiction, and he recently took a break from the more recent releases to take a look back at the first installments from one of Pocket’s various “literary spin-off” Star Trek series. In this case, we’re talking about the Starfleet Corps of Engineers.
Originally released as eBook novellas, Star Trek: S.C.E. (later renamed Corps of Engineers), published a new adventure monthly in near-continuous fashion from the fall of 2000 to early 2007. In total, 74 individual S.C.E./CoE tales were published, almost all of them edited by Keith, who co-created the series with editor John Ordover and also wrote or co-wrote ten installments; more than any other contributor…except for a couple of boneheads with whom you might be familiar.
:: cue theme music ::
In addition to the aforementioned co-creating thing, Keith also was one of the first writers to pen a story for the series. In this case, he was sandwiched between Dean Wesley Smith as the lead-off hitter and Christie Golden batting third. Once the first three stories were published in the summer/early fall of 2000 and it was determined that the series would continue, John and Keith set to work recruiting writers to assist in filling the monthly quota.
Enter the two boneheads I mentioned up-post.
As mentioned earlier, Dan Gunther has taken to reading and reviewing the series, which began collecting the eBook installments into omnibus paperback editions in early 2002. Dan reviewed each installment of the first collected volume, Have Tech, Will Travel, posting reviews on successive days a few weeks back. So, he has separate columns for each of the first four S.C.E. stories:
The Belly of the Beast, by Dean Wesley Smith
Fatal Error, by Keith
Hard Crash, by Christie Golden
Interphase, Part One by me and Kevin Dilmore
For those who don’t know, the Interphase two-parter (the second half was included in the second paperback compilation, Miracle Workers), released originally in early 2001, was mine and Kevin’s first-ever fiction collaboration. After those, Keith invited us to write what ended up being ten installments for the series, and another short story featuring the S.C.E. gang which was included in the Tales of the Dominion War anthology. Along the way, Kevin and I created a ship and crew for a 23rd century version of the Corps of Engineers, which later would feature prominently in the Star Trek: Vanguard series.
Based on his reviews, Dan seems to dig the S.C.E. gang, and I’m hoping he at least wants to see how Interphase ends, right? Thanks to him for giving the series a look, and to Keith for reminding me that all this was going on. It’s always cool to see a new review of something that’s usually fallen off everyone’s radar screens.
The Fog of Ward. 